45 years since Seattle’s network TV debut

Friday, September 27, 2013

Before “Frasier,” before “Grey’s Anatomy,” even long before the film “Sleepless in Seattle,” Seattle stood in the network TV spotlight.

This week marks 45 years since the debut of “Here Come the Brides,” a weekly ABC-TV show set in 1860s Seattle and based – loosely – on the real-life Asa Mercer Girls, who were single New England women imported for Seattle bachelors.

Perry Como had a hit with the show’s theme song, which included lyrics that Puget Sound residents found preposterous: “Smell of pine trees in the air, never knew a land so fair….” All self-respecting locals knew that fir trees – not pines – dominate the Western Washington landscape.

The show debuted Sept. 25, 1968, and lasted two seasons. It starred a cast that enjoyed decent fame: teen idol Bobby Sherman; David Soul, who later became Hutch on “Starsky and Hutch”; movie and TV icon Joan Blondell; and two men who were immortalized on “Star Trek,” Mark Lenard (who played Sarek, Spock’s father) and Robert Brown (Lazarus in a 1967 episode).